1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to a method of transporting flexible foil packages, particularly flat bags, filled with unstabilised, particularly pourable or flowable material, to a package container forming a stacking station, whereby the bags arriving flat in a consecutive row and containing the contents in a distributed manner are transported from a horizontal conveying path section via an arcuate conveying path section to a final vertical conveying path section extending to the stacking station, upon which the bags are retained clamped on both sides during the transport.
2. Discussion of Prior Art
In order to accommodate flexible foil packages, particularly flat bags, filled with unstabilised material, particularly pourable or flowable material, as closely as possible in package containers, cases for example, but without excessive pressure on the contents, (risk of damage to the contents, soups or fragile chips for example), the material present on one side in the bag after the filling operation and closure is distributed uniformly over the entire bag by agitation, so that the bag transported flat along the first horizontal conveying path section has only a comparatively low height. The flat bags with the contents thus distributed, on their further conveying route, after passing an arcuate sloping conveying path, enter the final almost vertical conveying path section, in which they are retained clamped by conveyor belts arranged oppositely. These conveyor belts end above a magazine divided into compartments, in which magazine the bags are mutually aligned. As long as the bags are retained clamped between the conveyor belts on both sides, the uniform distribution of the contents is maintained. However, after leaving the conveyor belts the bag contents can shift towards the lower edge of the bag again. This shifting is further promoted by the fact that the bags strike the floor of the magazine at unreduced conveying speed, so that the contents also accumulate at the lower edge of the bag for this reason. Due to this one-sided shifting of the contents, the compact filling of the package container with such bags is not ensured, or the bags are pressed too hard, which leads to damage to the contents. Furthermore, the bags are shock-stressed again after the transfer of the bags present in the magazine into the package container. Furthermore, the preliminary sorting in a magazine and the transfer into the package container restrict capacity. Lastly, this preliminary storing of the bags is restricted to a specific size of the package container. A particular preliminary magazine has to be made available for each container size.